Application Of Digital Colorimeter For Preliminary Characterization Of Gold Nanoparticle Swarms Produced By Termitomyces heimii Using A Novel Bioinspired Microfluidics Assay

In our laboratory work extending over several years we have successfully studied the biogeochemical role of termite mounds and their occupants the termites and the exosymbiont fungus-Termitomyces. Fungi appear to be promising for large scale production of nanoparticles (NPs) as these are simpler to grow both in laboratory and at industrial scale. This paper reports a novel microfluidic based assay system to detect Gold bioreduction capacity of different tissues in tissue based and cell free environment. Using sterile microtest wells, different tissues such as umbo, pileus, lamellae, stipe context, stipe epicutis, pseudorrhiza context, pseudorrhiza epicutis of Termitomyces heimii mature fruitbodies were tested with 200l chloroauric acid (one mM) and after an interval of 5, 10, 15, 30, 45, 60, 120 min and 12, 24 and 48 hours. The results in terms production of distinct nanoparticles were directly visualized microscopically and using mobile based digital colorimeter. Membrane filtered sterile water soluble extracts (SWSE) from the same tissues were similarly screened. The results manifested by mono and polydisperse GNPs and microparticles of mixed size groups demonstrated that cell free system can be potentially useful for bioinspired fabrication of GNPs. Further work in this direction is in progress using several termitomyces pure cultures.